justice. so there was some anti-semitism underground at the time the senate was considering this nomination. . >> he was very concerned when the british issued the white paper which limited immigration into what is now israel by jews trying to escape from hitler.

they were in charge under a mandate. i can remember grandfathers' anchor -- grandfather's anchor -- anchoger. that was his response to the british cutting off the escape to palestine for jews in europe. >> what was his relationship with chief justice taft? >> they had a good relationship and they saw things differently and, indeed, chief justice taft, as a private citizen, had been one of the former presidents of the american bar association who opposed grandfather's formation as a supreme court justice. -- confirmation as a supreme

court justice. before it was over, william howard taft, to grandfather and said william howard taft went over to grandfather. they served together for many years on the court di. >> they had a good relationship. >> they had a good relationship. justice taft opposed his nomination to the court, but then said that he had done him an injustice. i am very much moved by the role of supreme court -- the supreme court and i am very proud of these issues that grandfather was identified with. his thoughts have validity many years after he wrote them. the whole picture helps you see

the dedicated men that served their. the chief justices do their own work. >> you can watch both of these encore presentations again or get more information on the special at c- span.org/supremecourt. join us next week for america and the courts, saturday evenings at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> coming up, a look at president obama's first year in office. after that, a special presentation of our documentary "blair house: the president's

guest house." >> up next, a look at president obama's first year in office. hosted by the new america foundation, this is one hour 30 minutes. >> all that is left for me to say is that we are going to start with statements of about five minutes each by each of the participants and you are free to sit or stand. walter, -- you prefer standing. i take note of c-span's preference, but i see that you are not controlled by it. >> it really is great to be here at the intersection of two

intersections of my life. i have been associated with the new american foundation since it started and very much enjoyed being a member of the board and i am also on the executive committee of the editorial board of the american interest. two of my obsessions have come together. it is also true that my third obsession, which is the blog i started, is a part of this event. the essay that i contributed was originally a blog post and kind of developed from their. what i tried to do in the as saying -- in the essay was to talk about foreign policy but also to talk about the intersection of history and

politics both foreign and domestic. president obama really invited us to do this more than he knew a year ago. as you recall, there were a lot of comparisons of president obama and president lincoln. i was a little nervous when i started hearing all of these because one of the things you will notice about president lincoln is that he did not sali into washington talking about the comparisons between abraham lincoln and george washington. if anything, he was looking to keep expectations low rather than high. one thing that president obama has learned is that it is really hard to be president of the united states. [laughter] really, is a nightmare of a job. his american power is about two

contradictory things. on the one thing, -- on the one hand, as a global, leading power, we are trying to keep the status pretty much in quo. on the other hand, there is this seedings source of capitalist renewal -- seething source of capital is renewal. we are causing as much trouble when we are inventing the internet as when we are invading iraq. we are blowing up the status quo at the same time that we are trying to defend it and the president of the united states is caught at the board tax of these conflicting issues. president obama -- at the vortexes of these conflicting issues -- the vortexes of these conflicting issues.

use of president obama having to wrestle with all of these tensions. could you imagine the nerve it took to walk into closed-door sessions, blowing up diplomatic protocol. in doing this, not knowing if it was born to work. -- going to work. i wrote about an important moment for president obama. this will be in the summer of 1864, near the end of president lincoln's first term. the reelection campaign is going and it is not going well.

he and others think he is going to lose and they think he is going to lose to general mcclellan who will not pursue lincoln's core policies in the civil war. lincoln is living with the idea that he sent hundreds of thousands of young men to their deaths for a failed war. that he would be known for -- as a president who failed to hold the work together. he is getting up every morning with that knowledge. he is living with a wife who was psychotic. he was living with the ghost of two dead sons and this nonsense that it was all going to fall apart. president obama is going to face times like this. we live in a very tumultuous period. he will not have the comfort of knowing how the story comes out.

we and he will be seeing over the next four years what he is made of. i think that the early signs are encouraging, but is still one year into his term -- it is still one year into his term. thank you very much. >[applause] >> thank you walter. our first audience speaker will speak from the heavens with assistance from our staff. professor, the floor and ceiling are yours. >> i am sorry i cannot be there. my essay was focused on obama's grand strategy. they tend to be bullish in the early days and months, taking

the view that a bomb's global orientation is on the right track given the demand in international security environment. i start as others do by noting that obama has inherited a daunting challenge. two wars, stalled peace talks, hostile states acquiring nuclear weapons, global financial crisis, the recession, rising public debt and growing challenges from china and russia. my argument is that based on these tumultuous int'l environments, i would describe it as a set of threats that are

shifting and uncertain. as the obama administration articulated a grand strategy that is responsive to the challenges? my answer is i think so. the key task, which i believe obama seems to be articulating, is for the u.s. to put itself in the midst of building frameworks of sustained partnership and collective action on that. the challenges that might come to us in the years ahead, i get the sense that this is obama'visions -- owes -- this is a bomb's -- this is obama's

vision. it seems to me that he is a moderate internationally. he is liberal in his orientation towards engagement. he is a realist in his power of restraint and accommodation and looking for ways for russia and china to work pragmatically, despite differences. in this sense, it puts obama in the mainstream of postwar presidents. emphasizing alliances and partnerships with great power and a democratic community. i argue that there are two ways that he has made strategic

moves. first, he has articulated a clear and coherent vision of the u.s. security environment. as i read his speeches and actions, i see an emphasis on what he argues is the master trend in world politics. that increasingly more people and more places doing more things matter to american security. the u.s. cannot be secure a loan, it has to be secure together with other states -- to be secure a loan -- secure alone, it has to be secured

together with other states. attending to security interdependence which means how the criminal is thinking about deterrence, but how lots of people doing lots of things. all of these things matter more today than they did in the past. all of that, this deep movement of rising security into dependence creates rising demand for security corporations. as we look into the 21st century, we will have to do more of it in more places with more governments and peoples. i think that obama gets it. his focus on reviving the

issues, plus the emphasis on security. president clinton -- all of these are promising markers. this is functional and appropriate, given the environment that we face over the long term. the second positive strategic step that i think obama has made is in general we calibration of america's global position. the u.s., more than any of us often appreciate, found itself building an international system over the past half century where it was really at the center of it. it was the linchpin in the constitutional order for the world. the u.s. paid -- played the role

of a patron and was used with the larger government system. it was a good deal for the u.s. and other party iies. it was a court from work for world politics. -- a core framework for world politics. >> we need a quicker version because we have a lot to do yet. >> the bush administration had a constitutional crisis with other parties around the world and the obama administration has steps that are symbolic and important in the longer term and re-

establishing a constitutional bargain with key parties around the world and this creates the stable framework. for those two reasons, the first glimmer of grand strategic vision are very promising. [applause] >> you did reasonably well. that was very articulate. next up is richard perle. >> thank you, good morning. i begin my piece by recalling a conversation with a friend. he said that he hoped he knows

what he is doing. i said that i hope that he doesn't. the reason is i hope that he doesn't is that there is room for discovery. we may find a plan b. i hope that we find a plan b because plan a is not working. what i see is an attitude towards america's global role. it puts an unreasonable open hand on good will. that open hand has not been received with a an open hand by

our adversaries. -- with an open hand by our adversaries. received to a child as with a gift. -- he received hugo chapa sayveh a gift. just yesterday, castro, towards whom the administration has attempted what can only be called a reconciliation, accused president obama of lying. generosity with respect to vladimir putin was responded to

by a russian military maneuver a few days later that included a simulated invasion of poland. i think we are off to a pretty bad start when you get down to the specifics. it seems to me that president obama has made a fetish out of a cliche. the cliche is engagement. we talked to friends and we talked to adversaries. we talked to friends -- we talk to friends and we talked to adversaries. we hope to diminish the dangers that they posed to us. no one is against talking. sometimes, engagement cost a political price. would you go repeatedly to

iraq, which continues to support terrorism in a number of places and destabilizes the middle east, when you go repeatedly to iraq -- as it realizes its own citizens, you eventually begin to send a message and this message has been seen by others in the gulf and the message is that we are prepared to accord iran with the position of power -- with a position of power. you can convey a sense of where power lies by the way and manner in which you engage. i think that the president does not understand that. if he had, it would have been a far more disciplined approach to engagement and not repeated

approaches that were scorned and seen as embarrassing to the united states. walter performed -- walter referred to the arsonist. sometimes fires are put out by setting the liberal fires -- a deliberate fires -- by setting deliverberate fires. i am not against using fire to fight fire. whether it was right or wrong what i believe president bush was trying to do, one can criticize how it came out, but the technique of using fire to

fight fires seemed entirely appropriate and i hope that president obama discovers that in time. the professor refers to obama's global orientation, looking for ways to work with russia. i just referred to one of the ways he sought to work with russia by not proceeding with ballistic missile defense installation in eastern europe. i do not think that worked out very well. the focus of the administration's policy with russia is antiquated. it is focused on the arms control of the cold war when the cold war is over. it no longer matters very much to this country how many

warheads russia has. we should be reducing our nuclear arsenal beyond its current levels, but we should do that unilaterally. there is no reason why our implementing what is strategy should be a different calculation. we have a diplomatic establishment. the president reflects that. i hope we will have a plan b period the president's remarks on receiving the nobel prize, which are extraordinarily different from everything he said before, in fact it puts one

in mind of jimmy carter, that the world was a harsher place that he had previously understood. i am encouraged to think that president obama may be discovering that sometimes forces necessary. sometimes you have to fight fire with fire. sometimes engagement is not feasible or cannot be effective. [applause] >> thank you. we turn to our second audio presentation. are you on the line? any information? we will --

>> can you hear me? >> is that you? >> yes it is me. >> your five minutes is under way. >> the ritual is to say that i am sorry i cannot be with you. frankly, i would rather be sitting in california. [laughter] to observations that are not really debatable, one is that obama's presidency will depend on domestic policies, not the international arena. in the first year, we have seen changes in atmosphere, but not in substance. there are some problems in international politics that are not soluble -- soluble. the key issues that obama has to deal with our problems that he

cannot resolve. they can read his presidency, but it will not save his presidency. let me go over three of these quickly and then in with one issue of that some panelists have alluded to. pakistan, it is still stunning to me that there are leading american leaders that referred to pakistan as an ally. here is a country that has proliferated nuclear weapons, basically is allowed -- has allowed the afghan taliban to function in its borders and does not appear to have done very much to combat al qaeda @ operatives still working -- al qaeda operative is still working in pakistan -- operatives still working in pakistan.

we should avoid the kind of illusion that training in pakistan army or developing a reliable ally is possible. somehow, president obama could embrace richard perle and say that he was right. the israelis have come to the conclusion that force works. they tried the association's -- negotiations. they went into the west bank and build a security fence. they went into lebanon and in

the attacks from lebanon -- ended attacks from lebanon. from the israeli point of view, this worked and accommodation has failed. the palestinians, given their internal divisions within the palestinian authority and between the five top -- fatah and hamas. it has been unchanged whether we negotiate or not negotiate, this would lead the regime to change its policy because it could result in regime collapse. it would be unmanageable and very difficult for china. finally, i want to in on one

issue which i treated a little differently -- in on one issue which i treated a lot differently in my piece. -- in the on one issue which i treated a lot different in my piece -- end on one issue which i treated a lot differently in my piece. they could use nuclear weapons and give them to has blocked -- hezbolah. iran is not restraint the with the others are. the russians and the chinese need to be looked at through their national self-interest.

one fundamental major challenge in the administration, and i think it is a challenge that the administration can be judged, is whether or not to get russian and chinese cooperation in terms of bringing additional pressure on iran. there is also the possibility of a naval blockade. there is no real chance of a military attack from the united states or israel. there are real possibilities of altering iranian policy. those possibilities will reveal how adept at the united states is with dealing in check -- with china and russia if we are thinking -- with china and russia. if we are thinking about judging obama, i would focus on other

areas where he is stuck, regardless of if he continues to embrace the general orientation he has displayed in his first year. i would focus on iran. i am hoping that steve clemens will take up his remarks. thanks. [applause] >> thank you, steve. dave is next on the microphone. >> thanks so much. i am pleased that steve left us thinking about thinking about a ron -- iran. i am very much in agreement with

what steve laid out. let me just start in a different place. i, like most people, find many aspects of barack obama mesmerizing and find the possibilities of both his framing of challenges and the international community very compelling. when you look at the tasks that a president has and the portfolios they inherit, both the economic portfolio was in crisis and the power that the united states had on the foreign-policy front was miserable. it is probably the worst in my memory. to some degree, when you are a superpower and you engage the world militarily, economically,

and morally -- take the top three of those. militarily, economically, and we had moral dilemmas with things that happened at of the great -- abhu graib. we had a colleague here some years ago that wrote the book. it was about the benefits of bubbles in american history and what they have created. political bubbles can be useful tools when gravity is taking you down such a negative path that it buys you time to rearrange america's contract with the world and to reinvent

american leverage. what i see is obama's key challenge, that our nation can achieve the goals it set for itself. this is what translates into power. just before the inauguration, i saw rom emanuel and he said that all we can change right now of the optics of things. i thought it was a candid observation. i think they did a wonderful job changing the global optics and i am one that argued that for that alone, obama should be given the

nobel prize. changing the realities of global order and the way gravity is taking the nation means finding opportunities to convince the world that you have the capable -- the ability to reinvent american leverage. in my view, the administration picked the defining challenges, but of those, iran seems to be the highest security priority through which all other lenses needed to be viewed. moving the rush of course in the china coarse with the united states into different directions, some might say it is less destructive, it only

mattered if that was trying to shape the global order to were moved iran and decrease iran's ability to divide great powers around the world. israel palestine matters in that they give you a way to look at some normalization between arab states and israel and that is vital because it also robs iran of the ability to declare itself as the real defender of the islamic faith and it robs them of territory. when you begin to look at that, you see these moving pieces, but when you look at the team and you look at the very inconsistent performance of the administration, you see that it ultimately fails.

i want to say that it is not just foes that are animated by perception of american weakness. it is a change equilibrium. when i look at the fact that germany, saudi arabia and israel are all fundamental key, strategic targets for the united states, they have each rebuffed this a ministration -- this administration. these are reading as a measure that you would not be seeing allies behave the way that they are. when i watched the engagement of barack obama over the settlement issue, i am not one that supported the administration's perspective. nonetheless, once the decision was made, you could not afford

to lose. unwittingly, for consequently, the failure of barack obama to see that battled through, it turned that nomura -- netanyahu on a different path. we will see whether or not the united states has made any progress on that. if not, then the world will be sensing that we are not -- that we are in serious economic decline. [applause] >> thank you very much.

i also want to thank my panelists for leaving me in the area of domestic politics. i will try to touch on some things we have not talked -- talk about -- talk about -- talked about. he views his historical -- >> let me start by saying i am really impressed by disguise ambition. he has set in motion big changes across a spectrum of some of the most fraught impasses in america. i think this president deserves extra credit for the degree of

difficulty of what he has taken armed. -- taken on. he is not dodging any of the top ones. -- a top ones -- tough ones. the big question for me is whether his government tenacity will match the rhetorical audacity of his words and i think that the words to deeds ratio tilts decisively towards words. there is one accomplished what we have not talked about and that is the way this administration moved decisively in the first couple of months to stop the nation's economic freefall. no president since 1931 has faced as ugly and economic picture as barack obama -- as

ugly and economic picture as barack obama did -- and economic picture -- an economic picture as obama did. more importantly, it was a psychological impact of the panic that was widespread as this year began. we got an enormous boost from the fed. the energetic actions helped us prevent something much worse. he did it without succumbing to any of the feverish illogical advice coming from his own party or from the other side. he did not have to nationalize the banks.

i think he kept his head when others were not keeping bears. we still face an enormous job crisis that will be a big issue for the democrats as we head into next year's election. the bailouts have sparked a populist reaction and rekindled a strong anti-government kind of populism in this country. that all has to be dealt with. he probably will i get substantial credit for this, but the worst was diverted. we are on the brink of another great accomplishment which is a landmark health-care reform which is finally dealing with the glaring inequity. the fact that millions of citizens could not get health coverage and were vulnerable to injuries and diseases. that is a big gain for obama and his party. i am not a huge fan of this

bill. it does reform insurance markets but it is weak on cost control. we have to reduce medical cost inflation to do with our fiscal problems. looking at how we had to buy 60 votes, it is no question that this president obama wins on this, it will be winning ugly. of the health-care debate highlighted a great political challenge facing this president. i think that he really wanted to push beyond the toxic partisanship in washington. i have to say that i do not think the other party ever give him a fighting chance to do

that. as a result of that, the only debate that matters is on the progressive and of the spectrum to rea. obama's big issue is to finesse cleavages with the left. this president has succeeded powers of congress -- seeded powers of congress. he may have not had a choice. this would have cracked his coalition. one big question is whether it was a big win or if it would replenish its capital or it would reverse the falling polls.

the senate's appetite for taking on divisive issues has been exhausted for a while. this president does have to put it to jobs and fiscal irresponsibility -- has to put it to johnson fiscal irresponsibility -- has to picpt to jobs and fiscal irresponsibility. otherwise, public debts will jeopardize our recovery and diminish our economic sovereignty somehow, this president has to encourage more stilted measures next year.

lastly, i do actually think that the biggest challenge facing barack obama is afghanistan. i would not put iran indissoluble category. i do not think it is fair to judge him if he does no better than his predecessors in stopping the iranian nuclear program. but afghanistan is his. he has to succeed in this policy. he is going to be judged on this. democrats only recently got the monkey off their back of being the party that endangered national security.

we have already seen signs that he is not going to get a lot of help from his congressional leadership. this is a tough position for a democratic president to be in but he must have strategic stamina to succeed in afghanistan in order to convince the public that democrats can govern this country. that leads to my last point. this president has an amazing, historic opportunity to consolidate a new governing majority to affect the kind of political realignment that we haven't seen since the nixon/reagan one of the late '60s. that brings us back to holding this coalition together. so far, he has done very good at that. i am surprised.

it is forging al link between domestic ambitions and its willingness -- a link between domestic ambitions and its willingness to advance american values around the world that is missing. i think this is one of the principal challenges facing this party. thank you. [applause] >> i want to share with you a few words on leadership. let's look at obama as a leader. obama is everything in politics, an inspirational figure. this is traumatized by the passion of his campaign --

dramatized by the passion of his campaign. the very motive of the campaign was hope. hope that he would solve problems for us. there was no performance. we had to believe. i think that the decision to award him a nobel was made upon the same reasons. that he would do something very dramatic and resolve issues of war and peace. this notion of promise is not unique in american politics. reagan had it, franklin roosevelt had it, and it contributed greatly to their success. jimmy carter did not have it. the to bush's did not have --

the two bush's the not have it. obama inherited an economy collapsing from capitalist greed. he did by securing the fortunes of those who caused the disaster, but never explained adequately to the public why this was necessary. franklin roosevelt announced -- denounced what he called the malefactors of privilege. i think that the result was anchor field by those seeking to direct it from the perpetrators to the victims in the inheritors. -- and the inheritors.

the next issue is health care, to offer americans the kind of security that is offered as a given to people in economically advanced states. he never explained to the public exactly how it would work and why it was essential. i think it was a terrible mistake and resulted in a bill that was not as good bet -- as good as he would have liked. he did not explain how it would work or how it was essential. what he did was jointly offer, but he never sold it. he had congress decide what the health plan should be and a

strategy for achieving it which is rather like letting generals decide what objectives should be and what strategies should be in afghanistan. that is not a role for generals. the generals are supposed to carry out a political policy. i think that is what he has done in both of these cases. let's compare an analogous situation, which is harry truman and correa -- korea. they have their own policies they were intent on pursuing, fired macarthur and ultimately won vindication. this is a country where truman said the buck stops here.

he invoked the mantra of change. too often, he has offered hope. hope is a thin [unintelligible] he is following in george bush's footsteps being bogged down in two wars. he is the head of an alliance with no enemies. behind that shield is europe involving russia in a post cold war embrace.

the rise of china conference japan and india. in this emerging great power game where america is bogged down in afghanistan. i think the events in this area are slipping out of american control. obama is in danger of losing control over his own party as we saw in the health care debates. it is likely to spread to foreign policy as well. the rationale for his policy is unpersuasive. in fact, the strategy is possible, the engagement is

possible, only because of mercenaries and a volunteer army. a draft would cause an unpopular revolt and the public is able to associate itself from a war that the president has said is essential to the country's security. obama has great charisma, but charisma is a breed -- a declining asset. obama has fulfilled our lowest expectations. to be the fdr of this generation, he has to do as fdr did. he has to learn to be as tough as he is inspiring and he must learn that charisma, like beauty, inevitably fades.

and then the hard task of persuasion begins. thank you. [applause] >> thank you all very much. thank you, adam, for putting together such a diverse group. there is a lot of internal diversity about what has and has not happened. i thought i would use my time to do a couple of things. i would ask a little bit about subjects that were not addressed and then secondly, to respond to each other a little bit. i have made some notes that i hope will help with that. on the subject of what was not discussed, i try to put myself in the position of an earth studies ph.d. candidate and

following the united states very closely. there were a couple of exclusions to the economic crisis. if you think back to the beginning of the obama presidency, and the sense of free fall that the global economy was then -- was thein, there was no bottom available. the narrative was that it was an extraordinarily interdependent crisis. the birth of the 2-20 was the shape of the emerging world. i looked back to the scene at copenhagen where the president burst into the room, but who is in the room? brazil, india, china, what is

the arrangement of these new power arrangements? secondly, looking forward to the end of his first term, what is it reasonable to ask of this president in shaping what is reasonable to ask of this president in shaping -- >> what is reasonable to ask of this president in shaping this presidency. >> i am not so sure that it is a post american world. -- post-american world. we aren't indispensable nation, -- we are an indispensable nation. in asia, i thought that the coverage of obama's relations with asia was poor.

when he came back from asia, the prime minister of india came to the white house for a state visit and obama is effectively in certain the united states into haitian politics and recognizing the degree to which of the rising powers of asia turned to the united states for some kind of leverage and balance. . .

obama seems to be moving toward this new alignment. personally, i think this reinforces the need american role in the world, but of a different kind and with a different set of relations. >> richard, if you accept the premise of a pacific or indian ocean century, what you expect this president to achieve by way of inserting american interests into that new balance? >> i am not at all sure that we're going to see a shift of that kind. it remains the case, i think, that our diplomatic establishment is overwhelmingly oriented toward europe. that is where most of our diplomatic activity takes place. that is where most of our interactions take place. that is where are important alliance is.

with obama's visit to egypt, -- to asia, it was described by the japanese themselves as the worst visit ever by an american president to japan. i don't see a strategy. a state visit to india makes perfect sense, but i don't see a coherent strategy on that. what can we do? clearly, we have to reassure those allies who are likely to be intimidated by the very radicalized china. we have to do a better job dealing with them, and i think there are options that would entail mobilizing the chinese with help. i am sure that it is right that the chinese don't want to see a

collapse of the north korean regime, but they are also in a position to insist on at least external behavior. they have not been motivated to do so, and that is a challenge for obama. bush failed in this regard. i don't think he even tried. maybe obama will. recognizing that an alliance with india is almost certainly in the strategic interests of both countries, and fostering that, would beat a very astute thing to do. he has a problem with taiwan. i hope he will continue to take what has become the recent history of the american administrations, insisting that this dispute be resolved peacefully. i think he is it -- i think it is in the process of being resolved by them.

he can encourage that. >> steve, as we both complete this section and turned to a sense of back-and-forth, responding to each other's remarks, let me ask you, as a japan watcher, to offer some comments about the asia strategy. first, does he have an asia strategy? second, how do you judge the performance, both hillary clinton is tour and the presidents. secondly, part of that answer or separately, i think one of the ways that any reasonable panel would judge the performance of a president and international affairs would be to ask what has he accomplished in some of these difficult areas that he failed to accomplish, or what did he accomplish that another president might have missed. richard perle said president

obama, and having made a fetish out of cliche of engagement, because of this emphasis of the open hand, symbolically, there were consequences for the opposite power. practically in the case of missile defense in europe, he essentially got rolled. that is the argument. you accept that criticism, and if not, what is the evidence of the produced tactical achievements in the past year that another president less willing to extend an open hand might not have seized, if that is not enough to digest? >> thanks. very quickly, a friendly critique of my friend will marshall, who focused on afghanistan. this is a true story. two years ago, after the iraq invasion, i went to china's ministry in a said what is your strategy, what are you working on?

he said, we're trying to figure out how to keep you distracted and small middle eastern countries. we had such opportunity with china, that just coming back and arguing about a optic of barack obama putting on a lot of mileage on air force one, going to both north and south east asia as a benefit. it demonstrates we are back. there was a fundamental view among southeast asian nations and japan and korea that during the bush administration, the net is states was disengaged and it was not a priority. thus, when various architecture questions were coming up in the region, we were not perceive to be a player. one of his objectives by going appearing and going there, receiving the prime minister of japan has its first guests, hillary clinton making her first thought, was to demonstrate

we're not making a false choice. we're going to simultaneously manage our growth with china, and we will be embedded with any discussion on broad art -- on broader architecture in the region. does asia matter more to you than the europeans? that ignited that. i think the broader question of japan and china, has this benefit it -- could another president have done something or achieve something he did not? it is a complex challenge. in my view, you have the historic change in leadership inside japan, a nation that i think has put aside what i thought was a growing kind of dark nationalism and has replaced it with the possibility

of a negotiated pastoralism in japan. unfortunately, the party running japan today does not have experience and has picked various ornaments that it wants to use as ways to demonstrate change. one of them is the air station on okinawa airbase. in my view, we're running the risk today of not getting ahead of history in being reactive to it. we could see the entire u.s.- japan relationship it caught up and fighting. if we scratch beneath the surface, it was rooted in a lot of okinawan resentment and the rape of a 12-year-old girl by three american servicemen. there is dark stuff that is out there, and we're running the risk of the relationship to get sucked in that way. obama has shown himself unable or unwilling or not schooled enough to get ahead of it. on the china side of it, hillary clinton at the beginning of the

campaign said to george bush that she wanted to get us to go to the olympic games ceremonies , offending chinese sensibilities of a very ego shaping moment. in my view, you might have solved that and you raise the cost of chinese cooperation in other areas. the question with obama, and is complicated, are the benefits -- are their benefits? there is no thought doubt that one thing that he should credit for is working with the chinese. but chinese stimulus package was enormously significant. we work together in a lot of key ways. i think we pictured that we would not divorce each other in that process. that was a stable mechanism. if you achieve that mutually, as i said earlier, if iran is what matters, north korea matters,

are you able to have bothered leverage where china is actually doing anything to help you achieve -- are you able to actually have leverage with china is actually helping you achieve things? i think obama and his team are siphoning off too many of these problems and are not playing their hand well enough to demonstrate the ability to move simultaneously as they need to do. i believe that george w. bush's father operated under these terms, i think george w. was trying to do that at the end. if you go back, to some degree, i am sympathetic to this notion. i often hear, you are not giving obama enough time. if you look at the first year of every president except ford, since dwight eisenhower, each one of them had either some left curve thrown at them or they may decisive decisions early in the administration that shaped them

and were so keep. the notion that barack obama has not had enough time to not stand the test of scrutiny of other presidencies. i want him to do well. i really want barack obama to do well. i think other presidents as we have seen them have a greater sense of strategic payoffs and the downsides. >> let's come home before we turn to the audience, go to will and maybe think about his remarks and those of professor steele. will, you observed a lot of ambition and the president's domestic agenda, but more words than accomplishments so far. let's assume that we get to the state of the union on february 1 and health care reform that has changed the entire structure of the american health insurance market has been enacted, and he

is coming forward to celebrate what he will regard as an historic achievement and social policy. at that stage, does dr. steele's criticism that he does not have the toughness, the vision, the sense of direction that roosevelt had changed, in your view? does the ratio of words to accomplishments suddenly change? what do you think would be reasonable to expect of this president? >> i tried to say the same things, in a gentler way. i think this president has ceded too much authority to congress. the many legislative packages that he has pushed, and it has not imposed a distinctive obama's vision on them or policy coherence.

i also say he is facing a difficult problem. i think the fundamental issue that barack obama or any leading politician faces today is not the economy or afghanistan or iraq, it is broken politics. american people do not believe that politics deliver for them. they did not trust washington or government, they trust neither party. somebody has to make this democracy work. if he can get the health care bill through, and it will take several years before you see any immediate impact, but it is an accomplishment. this shows that somehow, out of the chaos, he can get something large done. i think that may make people more confident about what else he can achieve. this could restore his political capital. i don't want to overstate that. as i said, the senate will not want to go to the next hugely

divisive issue and say, let's talk about raising the cost of fuel in america. i do not see that happening. that is why i think the president will look at the economy and jobs the next year. but i agree with the underlying point, which is so far this president has been almost passive in his approach, willing to lay out broad goals and led his party take the reins, and the results are not beautiful, but the fundamental question is, compared to what? had he tried to lay out a template for health care reform at the beginning, my guess is it would look nothing like we have ended up with. >> dr. steele, to extend those remarks, imagining default -- david axelrod speaking on behalf of the president, wouldn't the narrative sounds something

like, we have been waiting since the 1960's to extend this core agenda of the democratic party. in the 1990's, we came close and failed utterly. in the intervening 20 years, we have been working with interest groups, doctors, insurers, all the structure of health insurance to set up the score agenda to achieve. the was incumbent on this president to bring that deal home, and that is fundamentally what he has done. if that is the argument in favor of the president's achievement, presuming it comes and in the next four, five weeks, it is it fair to criticize him? >> i think it is fair because he did not bring the public within. there is enormous outcry of anger and disappointment and alienation. for him to say, i brought it through, nobody else has done this, that is not an answer.

it does not satisfy those who say, you brought an answer that was not my problem. which is the case for many people who have insurance. and you did not persuade me that the cost of this was not going to be detrimental to my interests. what has happened is he has been seemingly absent from the debate. maybe pulling the strings from behind the scenes, but we have people we have never heard of like the senator from nebraska becoming the key figure in the health-care debate over relatively petty issues. but i think there is a sense that -- i think it is not just, but it is understandable -- that the public feels that decisions are being made that ignore their interests. they have not been persuaded by the president, the way in which it works for them, and that

anger is a result of i think exclusion. so instead of obama's sang "wii" are doing this, not the administration, but we the american public have to change the system because so many of us are suffering from that, it is rather that he is saying, you senators, you, nancy pelosi, what have you, harry reid, now you work a deal with your colleagues. congress does not have that much respect of the country anyway. they are always the suspect iedf doing things to the public's detriment, which is often the case. therefore, it is up to him to be the spokesman for the public. i don't think he has ever -- i don't think he has realized it, but he has never done it, and that is what the president has to be. >> i agree with the last point

very much, which is that obama has not cured over the heads of congress. however, just on public opinion, it is mutable. public opinion was strongly in favor of health-care reform, and we did something that looks like a success or a selling of it by the president, my guess is it will go back up. it is like the iraq war. americans were before it before they were against it, and i think you will see the same correction with health care. >> i think health care could become the poster boy for what professor steele was talking about, which is a profound disappointment in the way that the public's business gets done. all the details are not known, of course, but the managers bill which was introduced by harry reid, in which hundreds of aspects of the legislation were

changed, in many cases to accommodate the by off of individual senators -- the buy- off of individual senators, when is fully reporting, i believe it will be profoundly disappointing. it was not the way to deal with an issue of this magnitude. health care is to import for the kind of legislative treatment, and i think obama will pay a price for that -- it is too important for that kind of legislative treatment. >> right now, both the surge in afghanistan and the war in iraq are more popular, in some ways, then health care. a higher percentage of the population thinks the war in iraq was a success, then supports the current health care package. when a large domestic welfare program is less popular than

long, inconclusive foreign wars, you are not managing your portfolio well. whatever else can be said about what is going on here. so i think there is a problem. will may be right, once there is something to see, people may start liking it more and start seeing benefits, although some of that may not come quickly since it is not want to take effect. but right now, it is bad. there is no way to avoid that. >> the president has established this pattern of difficult pattern of policies of waiting until that an end to come in with a hail mary speech to clarify what he had accomplished. in the case of afghanistan, the west point speech i did not think was particularly successful if it had not been followed by the nobel speech. that probably would have been judged to have lost a little bit of his touch. let's go to the audience.

please wait for the microphone, identify yourself, and ask some questions, unlike myself. >> mr. mead, about a week ago, he greeted the administration and you gave them a b-minus, when israel and palestine you gave them a "d," because she said there was still time. what are the larger issues with obama, who he is listening to, his decision making process. two, out to prevented from being an "f" in succeeding years? >> since he got a b-overall, it suggests that his decision making process would have been different. i think is a big mistake, it seemed to me, and i don't think you can count -- you can avoid concluding it was a mistake, he asked israel to give him something that they had no

thing to give him, a complete settlement freeze. once he put that out there in public, that was the yardstick not only by which domestic opinion in the u.s. judged him but arab opinion. he said, look, i will be different from those other presidents and i will listen to you, and now i am putting this out front as the marker of how i am different from those other presidents. then he fails to achieve it. the arabs use the is really failure to say, well, we don't have to do anything now because they are not doing what you ask them to do. now to get the peace process going again, he is in this awful position of saying, well, you know, they have not done everything, but it sure looks nice. arabs are going, yeah, great. it is a bad situation, and is entirely self created. there was no objective force

making him set up that structured this way. in fact, the concessions he has gotten from netanyahu are actually fairly substantial. had he set this up in the beginning, this could have maybe looked more like de win than a loss, but he has created a difficult situation for himself. i don't think there is an immediate way out, but in the middle east, one event is always followed by another. i think there are some opportunities going forward. hopefully, this has been a lesson for him and some folks have told him this was the way to go, maybe he will not listen to them with such trust next time around. >> i am looking for some gender balance here, come on. all right, i will go to this gentleman, not because of gender.

[laughter] >> talk about self created problems. >> compared to a president like harry truman or church -- george herbert walker bush, president obama seems narcissistic. is narcissism a political and vulnerability or strength? how does a president who appears narcissistic harness that to augment and increase the public good? >> yes, steve? >> there is a very interesting book that many journalists reviled because the journalist who wrote it got very close to the president called, "renegade making," but if you read that, you are reading as close to an official biography as you will get. it is fascinating to see how he sees himself and some of these

issues. sidestepping the narcissism, it is interesting -- let me say this, in terms of what turns obama on, what animates him and his attention, we have seen over and over again, from afghanistan to cuba policy, israel, palestine, there are cases where he grows disinterested of things that have gone well or are delegated. is the things that are losing or he could walk in like michael jordan at the last minute and change the game and make himself to deliverer of an outcome that was otherwise unachievable. this is the narrative we are getting from copenhagen. he walked into a meeting that was bus to be bilateral, the chinese were trying to evade him, and he sat down next to the representative from brazil and changed the deal. it perfectly fits this narrative of obama's saving the day of what have -- what would have

been a complete disaster. i have noticed this cuba policy, where even up to three days before the summit of the americas, the a former ambassador to mexico was essentially delivering the new conservative line on latin america. there was no evidence at all that they were going to. position where obama went. when he got the portfolio, 180 degrees shift. -- when obama caught the portfolio, 180 degrees shift. when you get his attention, there is a need, almost a need, to fundamentally change the dynamics. and when you get those successes, show that narrative in the story. >> as moderator, i think that was adequately responsive to the narcissism question. [laughter] >> i am with the nation and

rolling stone magazine. john bolton said a while ago that we cannot stop iran from getting a bomb now if they want one. regardless of if that isn't -- regardless of if that is their intention, haven't we set ourselves up for failure by saying our goal is to stop the enrichment program in its tracks when the rest of the world is coming to terms with the idea that we're going to either have to accept or contain iran or something like that is, to happen, and here is the united states saying, no, we want to continue the bush policy of saying that iran what -- iran has to stop its harassment program. why not change the policy to say that we will allow it under these terms or similar, or otherwise than we are setting ourselves up for failure? that is why i think it is not

proper to make a test. if you make the test something you cannot achieve, of course you are going to fail. >> i don't agree with that narrative and i don't believe that scenario of iran is automatically one that depends on complete -- >> what is achievable? >> i think what is achievable is changing the environment around iran in the middle east, china, and russia, to essentially both robbed it of running room to spread its influence on national terrorism networks, but to also offer it what obama wanted to, which was a constructive course. i am not a believer in the kind of hillary clinton course of diplomacy at the moment because i do not believe the united states has the wherewithal to achieve that, but i don't think we have put on the table a strategy with iran that will ultimately change the direction. i worry about the sanctions policy because it will not

dissuade them. becomes an emotional and political holding place for our fears and ambitions, not something that will be efficacious in moving in their direction. >> richard, what do you think is achievable? also, if you recall, prof. crasner referred to a series of steps that would lead to a blockade, stopping short of a military movement. what is your view of what is achievable to get there? >> everything now must be put in the context of turbulence in iran, following the election. there is massive discontent with the mahmoud ahmadinejad administration, and it is beyond him -- and it goes beyond him. i think if he could do a real poll, which of course is not

possible, you would find support for the islamic republic of iran is way below half. now, we ought to be able to make something of that. we should have started years ago putting ourselves in the position to make something of it, since it has been clear for a very long time this was a very unpopular regime. it is now undeniable. so i think the key to stopping an iranian it nuclear weapon is a change in the regime, and i think most likely way to achieve it is when the people of iran decide to throw off -- >> everything has to be put in the context of the tumult. does that imply a pushover regime? >> let me give a concrete example. there is a lot of talk about and even some legislation making its way through congress, talk about

trying to limit the importation of refined petroleum product into iran. roughly half of the gasoline that goes in iranian cars and trucks and tanks every day is imported. there are only four refineries and iran. a combination of a disastrous accident at one or two of those refineries and real restraint in the sale of refined product could bring iran essentially to a halt. when you get very unhappy citizens lining up for hours to get 10 leaders rationed in their tank, -- 10 liters rationed in their tank, who knows what that would do. there are various things we could do to help change the regime. >> do you except that narrative

that -- you accept that narrative that it would help lead a revolt, but does it only reinforced the revolutionary guards narrative of siege and conspiracy that they used to justify their grip on power? >> this is a wonderful question that when you are president you have to give an answer to, even if you don't know the answer. i think the reality is barack obama will have to decide between these courses, with a lot of smart people telling him that each one is a disaster for each one of them will work. this is one of the reasons president's age quickly in office. i would say there is another factor we need to put on the board, which is there are other countries in the middle east with concern in the iranian nuclear program. the president may not have a completely free hand, and that

israel could launch some sort of strike on its own. it might well be that the iranians would assume that that had u.s. complicity, whether it did or did not. in any case, they may lash out against american interests in a way that would be difficult for the u.s. to avoid a military response back. i think part of what the president has to think about is that he is not fully in control of all of the factors that could present him with very serious decisions. the other thing i think that is important keep on board is that if the president were now to avow that he has given up the attempt to stop iranian progress towards a nuclear weapon, this would be a spectacularly unpopular decision. the last time i looked, 61% of

the people polled said they favored military action against the iranian nuclear program. part of the problem is, with that same 61% still support you nine months into the military actions against iran? nevertheless, one reason that a policy of relaxing and learning to live with an iranian bomb cannot be, has not been of out by the administration is because it cannot in american politics to that. in this sense, we may well be trapped into a policy which cannot succeed and which we cannot change. that may actually be where the administration sits right now. again, presidents earn their paychecks. >> we have reached 2:00, and that is an excellent place to

conclude. thank you. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> tomorrow, the international affairs professor looks at the

obama administration's next step for dealing with iran. a political preview of 2010 with political report editors. and daniel ericson looked at u.s.-cuba relations. "washington journal," live at 7:00 on c-span. >> sunday, michelle malkin take your calls, emails, and tweets. that is sunday at noon eastern on the "book tv." >> in just over half an hour, secretary of state hillary clinton talks about human rights. first, a special presentation of our documentary, the blair house, the president's guest house.

♪ >> the first blair house, the original home is the center section, the yellow part. that is the primary entrance. that is where it the president and foreign leaders are arrive and depart from. blair house is now the entire block. today, we have about 109 rooms, which is 70,000 square feet. to put that in perspective, we are 5000 square feet larger than the white house is. >> its primary mission is to be a guest home for world leaders who come to visit the president. it is used for that purpose.

in that mission, it has never failed. >> since 1942, this is the same marble floor that every world leader has walked upon. >> when you first come into blair house, it is easy to look at it and say, wow, this is a wonderful home or beautiful museum. it is much more. it is a tool of diplomacy for the united states. this is the way that the nation really opens its doors to guests that we want to honor with a particular way, to say this is our home, we're opening this to you, and you are here as our guest. >> when it was acquired by francis preston blair and 1837,

it eventually became called the blair house, and then later on simply blair house. >> the customer has ben that house is offered to the incoming president just before their inauguration. that would stay here for a time immediately before the inauguration. >> this is the story of a house on pennsylvania avenue. usually eclipsed by its famous neighbor, the white house. guesthouse for foreign leaders, home to presidential advisers, respite for presidents, temporary quarters for presidents alike. all of these describe blair house. -- temporary quarters for presidents-elect. all of these described blair

house. >> now you have entered the original blair house, the oldest part of the facility, built in 1824. if you had been here on may 1, 1850, he would have been along -- among the wedding party for william tecumseh sherman, who was married in this room. what is amazing about this house is everything is still here. the declaration may have changed, the colors may be different, but these are the same walls and floors that andrew jackson walked on, abraham lincoln walked on, and everybody in between and since then. ♪ in the 19th century, because the

blairs were were so politically active, was a behind-the-scenes, but always prominent, almost all political figures portraits are here. daniel webster, henry clay entertained in this house. >> living here and being of the belair family and so close to the white house, -- and being of the belair family and so close to the white house, this was one of the major places to entertain for president jackson and lincoln, certainly van buren, maybe a little bit of polk's before their falling out. >> no president took advantage of that hospitality more than abraham lincoln. >> i am sure that lincoln thought he could come from across the street at any time for a chat. that is the white house functioned. it could be an escape.

could be a place of privacy where things were not overheard, as far as we know. the president could relax and from of a warm fire with a nice brandy and talk over a very difficult issues and get good, sound advice, as well as a sympathetic shoulder. the last blair to live in the house when he was 5 years old remembers abraham lincoln sitting in his father's study off the front entrance. deep in conversation, with their feet propped up on the fireplace mantel. confidences were shared. there was a closeness. certainly, the night that robert e. lee was here with montgomery blair and francis preston blair for dinner at blair house, either over dinner at the belair dining room table and probably

continue into the study with the cigars and portraits, at lincoln's request, francis preston blair sr. and his sons offered the command of the union army to robert e. lee in that study. that is testimony to the family influence and power. >> in the center of the wall as a large engraving depicting president lincoln and his cabinet. the oldest blair son, montgomery blair, served in lincoln's cabinet. he is standing on the far right. he was the postmaster general. at that time, that was a a full cabinet post, which it is not today. under that is a very rare mathew brady photograph of general sherman and his senior advisers. another son, frank belair jr., is also in that photo. what is phenomenal about this

photograph, remember, this is civil war photography. matthew brady has superimposed him into the image. franked blair -- frank blair was not present the day this was taken. i>> a foreign dignitary only is to say here at the invitation of the president. it is usually individuals who are from countries we have good relations with or that people we do not have good relations with and we're trying to establish better relations with. when they are guests at the blair house, they are guests of the united states, just as they would be the president's home. it is really the guest house for the president, but is really the

guest house for america. ♪ >> this house, besides being the president's guest house, it has a key role in diplomacy. it is often the linchpin of a visit from a foreign leader. this is one of the great benefits as a leader comes to visit with our president of being able to stay in this house. is very important as part of our diplomacy to whether this house is offered or not. it is a place for leaders to stay. it is often a sign of great respect and love. hospitality on our part. >> one of the most important

responsibilities of the protocol office of the blair house, if a leader is going to be staying here, we have an assistant chief of protocol who was the manager of the house, the blair house, who will actually take care of the party who will be staying here. to have to make sure that our guests are comfortable, not just for staying overnight or three nights perhaps, but also they have to work here as well. this is a base of operations for them. we want to make sure that they feel entirely comfortable while they are here. >> most of the world leaders to meet with president want to stay here. there is a set formula on how the invitation it is issued. there are less to stay here than want to stay here. >> you do not invite any of for one -- you cannot invite everyone to your home, but those you do, you either want to send

a message that you have a good solid relationship or you want to build a better relationship. >> this it is only one of the -- this is one of the only rooms that you will see occasionally in the media. for protocol terms, the lower ranking person should go to the heyer ranking person for meetings. for us, that means that our vice president and all our cabinet secretaries come to blair house to meet with prime ministers, presidents, and monarchs who stay here.

the wallpaper in the room, definitely the most striking part of the room. >> that is 18th century, hand- painted chinese wallpaper for the export market. it is rice paper, now completely restored. that was acquired by the kennedy secretary of the secretary, steve douglas dillon and his wife, from near westminster, england. the panels being only 8 feet high when they arrive from their home in england, are ceilings were 11 feet high in the room, so the upper portion and lower portion were painted in.

>> > >to 1952, -- from 1948 to 1952, blair house became the president's home as the white house wondeunderwent restoratio. the house itself, even with the quick cosmetics apply the year before, was not only nothing very grand but a bit dowdy. it creaked and groaned, trembled noticeably when streetcars passed by. it's dark old cellar was full of rats, as was well known by the secret service men who hate it ever going down there. of all the presidents they had

known, some of the secret service men would say, only harry truman would have been willing to live in the place. but not everyone felt that way. margaret truman remembered it this way in her biography -- "every room, especially on the first floor was a masterpiece. most every piece of furniture was a rare or from france. crystal chandeliers gleam above magnificent rugs and gilded mirrors and wood-paneled dining room was utterly charming." >> this house has an unbelievable history of great moments in history, moments

where wars were discussed and committed to it and peace agreements were committed to. >> date, 1950. president truman and his advisers make critical decisions about u.s. involvement in korea. truman's biographer wrote about it. "that night, after supper alone, truman summoned another emergency session, a second war cabinet meeting at blair house." "i don't want to go to war, he said. everything i have done has been to avoid making a decision such as i had to make tonight."

>> for president truman, this was the temporary cabinet room. many of his meetings were here, even though the west wing was not affected by the renovation worked and he had use of the cabinet room at the white house. this became a convenient cabinet room for him because it was just 12 feet away from where he was sleeping. historically, and especially for european guests, this room is incredibly significant. in this room, at this table, the first concept and the first draft of the marshall plan were

created. this is also where the truman doctrine originated. we know that this is where the president signed documents that committed american troops to the korean war. it is also where he made the final decision to fire macarthur. and it was the scene of many of his famous midnight poker games. during the time the president and mrs. truman lived here, this was their primary dining room, which is where there would have posted dinner with princess elizabeth, churchill, and countless others.

>> sometimes i would have dinner alone. i would walk into the hangar. -- howard walk into the dining room. he would pull out my chair, pushed me up to the table, make me a fruit cup, take away the empty cup. theo brings me a plate, barnett brings me a tenderloin, carrots, and beats. i have to eat alone in a candle lit room.

>> this is another very special room to blair house history. this was truman's office. the portrait of truman we have is by rita kempton, who also painted the official white house portrait of truman, and she copied those works during the reagan renovation and the 1980's. -- in the 1980's.

the mantle in this room is part of the white house that was installed in the light house during the 1901 renovation. during the truman renovation, it was brought to blair house so that harry truman would have a visual reminder of the white house during the years that he did not get to live there. the president's favorite color was green. the walls were green, the draperies were green, the carpet was green. he had a small desk that sat in the middle of the floor, back from the fireplace. you are only feet off pennsylvania avenue, with trafficked back then, trolley cars, and here set a precedent. -- and here sat the president.

>> this is an open passageway. this was the master bedroom of the house. this would have been president truman's bedroom. this is the window that he ran to on november 1, 1950, when he heard gunshots outside. he actually witnessed the gun battle where one of his agents was killed, one of the attackers was killed. >> in 1971, this room was dedicated to president dwight house -- polite eisenhower. this is the president's prayer that once hung in the oval office.

these are two oil paintings done by president eisenhower. it was an incident in this room in the 1980's that resulted in the closing of blair house for a six-year renovation project. a television -- a telephone call came to the chief of protocol from president reagan's deputy chief of staff. >> he called me one day and said, mrs. reagan feels and i feel that we must shut blair house down.

mike was disturbed, as was mrs. reagan, when she heard that a chandelier had fallen on a bed while the tunisian president was in residence -- and while the tunisian president was in residence, the boiler had blown up. that was enough. also, it was not looking very good. it was looking bad. before the restoration, the money had to be approved by the government every year. congress did not want to fund it at all. senator abner, who was the head of the committee was being so negative about it, said, i don't understand why you have to spend all that money to build an old house. what he just tearing down and build a new house? i said, over my dead body.

finally, we worked around it. i was grateful to the senator he was able to really get it through. but there was a very interesting stipulation. the money was to be used for bridge and mortar, the new addition, all of that, but not one cent to be allocated for decorating. what does that mean? obviously, we had to raise it. .

>> this was the private quarters for the president, the prime minister, the cane, or the queen that was staying with us. this is construction bill to look like the rest of the house. -- this is 1988 construction bill to to look like the rest of the house. -- built to look like the rest

of the house.

>> mrs. one of the great historical pieces in our collection. every president that has been

here and also every foreign leader that has stayed here -- it is a fantastic collection of comments, significant world leaders that have changed the world through their actions. >> in 1942, there were a series of visits. king george of greece, young king peter of yugoslavia, foreign minister of russia state here. winston churchill stay there. truman and his family as well. >> blair house is an important asset. we want to put our best foot forward. we want to make whoever comes to

this country feel welcome and happy to be here. with a house like that, believe me, it really has a psychological effect. sometimes, as many as 20, 35, 36 visits a year and some of them have been for three days or four days. it is a task to house leaders and make sure that every need they have is met. diplomacy does not happen until two people engaged. by nature of what they do, offering personal service and caring for someone who is arriving, it is not on the political level. it is what we hope our gracious hospitality to world leaders.

>> it is deep and intense, especially times when we are hosting the president-elect or whether we are hosting the widow and the family of a deceased president for a state funeral. >> president reagan once wrote me a letter and said that [unintelligible] i never forgot that. we represent form. but to give the visitor in a warm welcome, that is a spirit that is really beautiful and not overbearing, but where he or she can be comfortable is our aim. that is what we aim to do, to

set a nice towne for the visit, even with someone that we may not be having a good relationship with. hospitality is very important. >> up next, secretary of state hillary clinton. there will also be a debate on health care policy. then, two interviews from c-

span's documentary, "the supreme court, home to america's highest court." >> after a while, it really sinks in. it is gone. you do not own it anymore. you are trespassing. that hurts. my positions are now in a storage bin. >> this week, leslie and andrew cockburn on american casino, their award winning documentary on the impact of subprime mortgages on minorities. that is sunday night at 8:00 p.m. >> in a couple of minutes, we will hear secretary of state hillary clinton give a speech on human rights. but first, opening remarks from a georgetown university student.

[applause] >> it is my distinct honor to welcome you this afternoon to the human rights agenda for the 21st century with the hon. secretary of state hillary clinton on december 10, it marked the international human rights day. we were there for the drafting for the depression of the human rights.

they unanimously adopted this short document. as a senior, i have had the opportunity to take a course in the human rights culture. however, our course observed that the passing six decades have painted a rather different picture. since the holocaust, never again shall impassioned cries fall on deaf ears. although identify responsibility to protect the international community remains negligent in pressing humanity crises, such as that in the condo. people continue to line their pockets as the impoverished in the world continue to struggle to put food on their tables and clothes on their back. nevertheless, the human rights

culture thrives on the support of various factors. georgetown has played its part. leadership on global health issues to student-led initiatives [unintelligible] if the human rights culture is to persevere, it requires strong support from government. it needs champions such as madame secretary hillary clinton. i am honored that she would deliver her address here at georgetown university. let me introduce [unintelligible] [applause] this is the president of joh georgetown university.

he has also helped to expand and deepen georgetown's participation in global [unintelligible] he is a member of the council of foreign relations, chair of the board of compact, and for the form of future higher education. -- and for the forum of future higher education. most recently, he was honored in 2008. please give him a round of applause. [applause] >> it is my pleasure to welcome you all here this afternoon. it is truly an honor to have with the united states secretary

of state, hillary rodham clinton, to discuss human rights in the 21st century. at a time when nations are increasingly interdependent and people increasingly interconnected, the situation in any one nation a fax every nation in the global community. for nearly four decades, in various roles, secretary clinton has been a champion for the cause of human rights. she has been the champion of human dignity, of human worth, both here and abroad, for the neediest and most of vulnerable and the most wounded in our midst. she has been the voice for the voiceless and powerless, most

especially for women and children. in 1995, she declared that human rights are women's rights. and women's rights are human rights this is now considered a milestone event in the history of the struggle. the last time that the secretary was here with us, it was 2004, when senator clinton was here for a conference on national security and the military reserve. hillary rodham clinton now serves says the 67th united states secretary of state. her predecessors include thomas jefferson, james madison, james monroe, daniel webster, and george marshall, and, of course, madeleine albright, georgetown's distinguished professor in the

practice of diplomacy. do work together to launch of the federal government's vital voices initiative. it is now a nonprofit organization that works to train and organized women leaders from around the world. before being appointed to her current position by president obama, secretary clinton served as a united states senator for new york where she was a strong advocate for the expansion of economic opportunity and health care. as first lady, for it years, she worked on many issues relating to women and families, especially health care, including leading a successful bipartisan effort to provide care for millions of children to the health insurance program. secretary clinton's biography is also one of firsts. she is the first first lady to hold a lottery, the first sitting first lady to be -- to

hold a law degree, the first sitting first lady to be in [unintelligible] the first woman to na statwhen a state presidential nomination, and also the first [unintelligible] ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to introduce the united states secretary of state, the hon. hillary rodham clinton. [applause]

>> thank you. it is wonderful being back here at georgetown in this magnificent hall and to give you something to do during exam week. [laughter] it is one of those cause i- legitimate reasons for taking a break. -- is one of those quasi- legitimate reasons for taking a break. [laughter] clearly, those of you who are in the foreign service school heard reflections of the extraordinary opportunities given to study here as he spoke about the culture of human rights. it is also a real honor for me

to be delivering this speech at georgetown because there is no better place than this university ito talk about human rights. the president and the administration of the school embodied the university's long tradition of free inquiry and the cause of human rights around the world. i know that he has taught a course on human rights. as well as on the ethics of international development, along with my longtime colleague carol lancaster. i want to commend the faculty who are helping to shape our thinking on human rights, on conflict resolution, on development he and related subjects. it is important to be at this university because the students, the faculty, every single year, ad to the intra-religious

dialogue. you give voice to the advocates who are working on the front line of the global human rights movement through the human rights institute here at the law school and other programs. the opportunities that you provide your students to work in the international women's rights clinic is especially close to my heart. all of these efforts reflected the deep commitment that the georgetown administration, faculty, and students to this cause. first and foremost, i am here to say thank you.

thank you for all that you do and all the georgetown has done. [applause] today, i want to speak to you about the obama administration's human rights agenda for the 21st century. it is a subject on the minds of many people who are eager to hear our approach and understandably so. it is a critical issue that warrants are energy and our attention. my comments today will provide an overview on thinking of human rights and democracy and how they fit into our broader foreign policy, as well as the principles and the policies that guide our approach. let me also say what this is not. it could not be a comprehensive accounting of abuses or nations with whom we have raised human rights concerns. it could not be and is not a

checklist or a scorecard. we report every year and it goes into great detail about the many concerns we have for many countries. i hope we can use this opportunity to look at this important issue in a broader like and appreciate its full complexity, morally, and urgency. with that, let me turn to the business at hand. in his acceptance speech for the nobel peace prize last week, president obama said that, while war is never welcome or good, it will sometimes be right and necessary. in his words, only a just peace based upon the inherent rights and dignity of every individual can be truly lasting. there have been those who have violently denied the truth. our mission is to embrace it, to work for lasting peace, through

a principled human rights agenda and a strategy to implement it. president obama's speech also reminded us that our basic values, the once enshrined in our declaration of independence, the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not only the source of our strength and endurance. they are the birthright of every woman, man, and child on earth. that is also the promise of the universal declaration of human rights. the prerequisite for building a world in which every person has an opportunity to live up to her or his god-given potential and the power behind every movement for freedom, the rape kicampaign for democracy, every development in every struggle against oppression, the potential within every person to learn, discover, and embrace the world around them, the potential to join freely with others to

shape their communities and their societies so that every person can find fulfillment and self-sufficiency, the potential to share life's duties and tragedies, laughter, and tears with the people we love -- that potential is sacred. that, however, is a dangerous believe too many who hold power and who construct their position against another, another tribe or religion or race or gender or political party. standing up against that false sense of identity and expanding the circle of rights and opportunities to all people, advancing their freedoms and possibilities, is why we do what we do. this week, we observe human rights week. at the state department, though, every week is human rights week. 61 years ago this month, the world leaders proclaimed a new

framework of rights laws and institutions that could fulfill the valid "never again." they observed the universality of human rights through the universal declaration and verbal agreements, including those aimed at combating genocide, war crimes, and torture, and challenging discrimination against women and racial and other minorities. they became essential partners in advancing the principle that every person counts and exposing those who violate that standard. if we celebrate that progress, though, our focus must be on the work that remains to be done. the preamble of the universe -- the preamble of the universal declaration of human rights encourages us to use it as a standard of achievement and so we should. but we cannot deny the gap that remains between its eloquent

promises and the life experiences of so many of our fellow human beings. now we must finish the job. our human rights agenda for the 21st century is to make human rights and human reality. the first step is to see human rights in a broad context. of course, people must be free from the oppression of tyranny , from torture, from discrimination, from leaders who would oppress them or disappear them. to fulfill their potential, people must be free to choose laws and leaders, to share and access information, to speak, criticized, and debate. they must be free to worship, a sensitive, and to love in the way that they choose. and they must be free to pursue the dignity that comes with self

improvement and self-reliance, to build their minds and their skills, to bring their goods to the marketplace and participate in the process of innovation human rights have both negative and positive requirements. people should be free from tyranny in whatever form and they should be free to seize the opportunities of a full life. that is what supporting democracy and fostering development are cornerstones of our 21st century human rights agenda. this administration, like others before us, will promote, support, and defend democracy. we will relinquish neither the word nor the idea to those who have used it to nearly or to justify unwise policies. we stand for democracy, not because we want other countries to be like us, but because we want all people to enjoy the consistent protection of the rights that are naturally there's, whether they were born

in tallahassee or tehran. democracy has proven the best political system for making human rights a human reality over the long term. but it is crucial that we clarify what we mean when we talk about democracy. democracy means not only elections to choose leaders, but also active citizens and a free press and an independent judiciary and transparent and responsive institutions that are accountable tooto all citizens and protect their rights fairly and equally. it is not a choice of leaders make day-by-day. it is the reason they govern. democracies protect and respect citizens every day, not just on election day. democracy is demonstrate their greatness, not by insisting that they are perfect, but by using their institutions and

their principles to make themselves and their union more perfect, just as our country continues to do after two hundred 33 years. at the same time, human development must also be part of our human rights agenda. basic levels of well-being, food, shelter, health, and education, and the public, and goods, like environmental sustainability, protection against pandemic disease, provisions for refugees, these are necessary for people to exercise their rights. because human development and democracy are mutually reinforcing, democratic governments are not likely to survive long if their systems to not have the basic necessities of life. the desperation caused by poverty and disease leads to violence that further imperils the rights of people and threatens the stability of governments. democracies that deliver on

rights, opportunities, and development for their people are stable, strong, and most likely to enable people to live up to their potential. so human rights, democracy, and development are not three separate schools with three separate agendas. that view does not reflect the reality we face. to make a real and long-term difference in people's lives, we have to tackle three simultaneously with a commitment that is smart, strategic, determined, and long term. we should measure our success by asking this question -- are more people in more places better able to exercise their universal rights and live up to their potential because of our actions? our principles, our tools, and taxetactics must be flexible.

in some cases, governments are willing, but unable, without support to establish a strong institutions and protections for their citizens. for example, the nascent democracies in africa. we can extend your hand as a partner to help them try to achieve authority and build the progress they desire. in other cases, like cuba or nigeria, governments are able, but unwilling to make the changes their citizens deserve. there we must vigorously encourage those leaders to end the persian. in cases where governments are both unwilling and unable, places like the eastern, though, we have to support those courageous individuals and organizations who try to protect people and do battle against the odds to plant seeds for a more

hopeful future. i do not need to tell you that the challenges we face are diverse and complicated. there is not one approach or formula, doctrine or severity that can be easily applied to every situation. i want to outline for elements of the obama administration's approach to putting our principles into action and share with you some of the challenges that we face in doing so. first, a commitment to human rights search with universal standards and holding everyone accountable to those standards, including ourselves. on his second full day in office, president obama issued an executive prohibiting torture by any u.s. official and ordered the closure of guantanamo bay. next year, we will report on human trafficking, as we do every year. this time, it will only be on other countries, but also on our

own. we will participate, through the united nations, in the universal periodic review of their own human rights record, just as we encourage other nations to do. by holding yourself accountable, we reinforce our moral authority to demand that all governments to adhere to obligations under international law, among them not to torture, arbitrarily detain and persecute the centers, or engage in political killings. our governments and the international communities must counter the pretensions of those who deny or advocate their responsibilities and hold violators into account. sometimes we will have the most impact by publicly denouncing a public action, like the two in honduras for the violence in guinea -- like the coup in honduras or the violence in

guinea. in every instance, and our aim is to make a difference, not to prove a point. calling for accountability does not start or stop with the naming offenders. our goal is to demand that governments take responsibility by putting human rights into law and inventing them in government institutions by building strong, independent courts, competent and disciplined police and law enforcement. governments should be expected to resist the temptation to restrict freedom of temptation when criticism arises and to be vigilant in preventing loss from becoming an instrument of oppression -- preventing law from becoming an instrument of oppression. we know that all governments and all leaders sometimes fall short. so there has to be internal

mechanisms of accountability when rights are violated. often, the toughest test for governments, which is essential to the protection of human rights, it is absorbing and accepting criticism. here, too, we should lead by example. in the last six decades, we have done this, in perfectly at times, but with significant outcomes. by making amends for the interment of error on japanese american citizens in world war ii, to establishing recourse for victims of discrimination in the jim crow south, to pass in hate crimes legislation to include attacks against gays and lesbians -- acknowledging and remedying mistakes does not make as weaker. it reaffirms the strength of our principles and institutions. second, we must be pragmatic and

agile in pursuit of our human rights agenda. not compromising on our principles, but to do and what is most likely to make them real. we will use all the tools at our disposal. when we run up against a wall, we will not retreat with resignation or recrimination or repeatedly run up against the same mall, but respond -- the same wall, but respond with a mother worked way -- with another way to improve change. when all methods are not working, we will not be afraid to pursue new ones. in iran, we have offered to negotiate directly with the government on nuclear issues, but have expressed solidarity with those inside iran who are looking for democratic change.

as president obama said, they have less on their side. we will hold governments accountable if -- they have us on their side will hold government accountable. as the president said last week, we must try as best we can to bounce isolation and engagement, pressure and incentives, so that human rights and dignity are advanced over time. we are also working for positive change within multilateral institutions. they are valuable tools that, at their best, leverage the efforts of many countries around a common purpose. we have rejoined the u.n. human rights council, not because we do not see its flaws, but because we see that [unintelligible] we co-sponsored the successful revolution on freedom of

expression, a forceful declaration of principle at a time when that freedom is jeopardized by new efforts to constrain religious practice, including recently in switzerland, and by efforts to criminalize the definition of religion, a false solution which exchanges when wrong for another. i was privileged to share when we passed a resolution [unintelligible] principled pragmatism informs our approach on human rights. cooperation with each of those is critical to the help of the global economy and the non- proliferation agenda we seek and to managing a security issues like north korea and iran and addressing global problems like climate change. the united states seeks positive

relationships with china and russia. that means candid discussions of divergent views. in china, we call for protection of rights of minorities into bein tibet and for civil society and organizations to abdicate their positions within the framework of the rule of law. we believe that those who advocate peacefully for reform within the constitution should not be prosecuted. with russia, we deplore the murder of journalists and activists who support the courageous individuals who advocate at great peril for democracy. with china, russia, and others, we are engaging on issues of mutual interest while also engaging suicidal actors in these same countries who are working to advance human rights and democracy. the assumption that we must do

their pursuit human rights for our national interest is wrong. -- the assumption that we must pursue either a human rights or our national interest is wrong. across our diplomacy and development efforts, we keep striving for innovative ways to achieve results. that is why i commission to the first-ever quadrennial diplomacy and development review to develop a forward-looking strategy built on analysis of our objectives, our challenges, our tools, and their capacities to achieve america's foreign- policy and national-security objectives. make no mistake. issues of democracy and governance are central to this review. the third element of our approach is that we support change driven by citizens and their communities. the project of making human rights and human reality cannot be just one for governance.

it requires cooperation among individuals and organizations, within communities and across borders. it means that we work with others who share our commitment to securing lives of dignity for all who share the bonds of humanity. six weeks in morocco, i met with civil society activists. they magnify how change comes from within and how it depends on activists who create the spatece within which they can create development and democracy. outside governments and global civil society cannot impose change, but we can promote and bolstering it and defend it. we can encourage and provide support for local grassroots leaders, providing a lifeline of protection to human rights and

democracy activists when they get in trouble for raising sensitive issues and voicing dissent. using tools like our global human rights defenders fund which has provided targeted, legal, and relocation assistance to 170 human rights defenders around the world. we can stand with the defenders publicly, as we have by sending a high-level diplomatic mission to meet with [unintelligible] and as i have from guatemala to egypt, talking with leaders who are working to try to change their societies from within. we can amplify the voice is of advocates working on these issues by shining a spotlight on their progress. they often pursue their mission

in isolation, often so marginalized within their own society. we can endorse the legitimacy of their efforts. we recognize these with honors like the women of courage award that first lady michelle obama and i presented earlier this year and the human rights defenders award i will present next month. and we can applaud others like vital voices and the lantos foundation that i do the same. we can give them access to public forums and continue to press for a role for non- governmental organizations and multilateral institutions. and we can unless other allies, like international labor unions who were instrumental in the solidarity movement in poland, where religious organizations who are championing the rights of people living with hiv/aids in africa.

we can help agents share information through the internet and mobile phones so they can communicate and organize, with camera phones and facebook pages, thousands of protesters in iran have broadcast fotheir demand for its denied. i have established a special unit inside the state department for technology for 21st century statecraft. in every country i have visited, i conduct a town hall or a round table discussion, to learn from them and to provide a platform for their voices, ideas, and opinions. when i was recently in russia, i visited an independent radio station to give an interview and expressed through word and deed our support for independent media at a time when free expression is under threat. on my visits to china, i have

made it a point to visit with women activists. in 1998, i met with a small group of lawyers in a crowded apartment on the fifth floor of a walkup building. they describe for me their desire to win rights for women to own property and to have a say in marriage and divorce. i met some of the same women, but the group had grown and expanded its scope. now there were women who were working not just for legal rights, but for anmile environmental rights. one has been harassed for speaking out about aids in china. she should be applauded by her government. ngo's and civil society leaders need the technological and

political support we provide. many repressive regimes have tried to limit the independence and effectiveness of activists and ngo's by restricting their activities, including more than 25 governments that have recently adopted new restrictions. but our funding and support can give a foothold to local organizations, training programs, and independent media. one of the most important ways that we and others can lay the foundation for a change from the bottom-up is through targeted assistance to those in need and through partnerships that foster broadbased economic development. to build success for the long run, our development assistance needs to be as effective as possible at delivering results and paving the way for broadbased growth and long term self-reliance. that is beyond giving people the capacity to meet their material needs for today. it should give them a stake in

securing their own future, in seen their site is become the kind of democracy is that protect rights and who govern fairly. our activities act in concert to support democratic governance. that is the pressing challenge we face in afghanistan and pakistan today. the fourth element of our approaches that we will widen our focus. we will not forget that positive change must be reinforced and strengthened where hope is on the rise and we will not ignored or overlooked places of seemingly intractable tragedy and despair. where human lives hang in the bills, we must do what we can to tilt that ballast ward a better future. -- where human lives hang in the balance, we must do what we can to tilt the balance toward a

better future. it cannot be subject to the winds and the wind of political change in our own country. we should never take for granted its permanence. backsliding is always a threat as we have learned as in places like kenya. when democratic change occurs, we can afford to become complacent. we have to continue reenforcing ngo's and the fledgling institutions of democracy. young democracies, like liberia, east timor, kosovo, they need our help to secure their improvements and their welfare. we must stay engaged to nurture democratic development.

we stand ready, both in our bilateral the ships and through international institutions, to help governments who have committed to improving themselves by assisting them in fighting corruption and helping to train police forces and public servants. we will support regional organizations and institutions, like the organization of american states, the african union, and the association of southeast asian nations, where they take their own steps to protect their democratic institutions. even as we enforce the successes and conscience demands so we are not cowed by the overwhelming difficulty in making inroads in

hard places like sudan, combo, north korea, zimbabwe, or on the hard issues, like ending gender inequality and discrimination against gays and lesbians from the middle list to south america, africa, and asia. in sudan, ongoing tensions threaten the devastation oand the genocide of doodarfur. we can focus our efforts on preventing genocide elsewhere. we have to remain focused on women, women's rights, women's roles, and women's responsibility. as i said in beijing in 1995, human-rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights. i wish it could be so easily translated into action and changes. that ideal is far from being realized in some many places

around our world. there's no place that so epitomizes the difficult and tragic circumstances confronting women than in eastern congo. i was in goma last august, the epicenter of one of the most violent and chaotic regions on earth. when i was there, i met with the victims of perfect gender and sexual violence. i met with refugees driven from their homes by the many military forces operating there. i met with those offering to negotiate the conflict. i saw the best and the worst of humanity in a single day, the unspeakable acts of violence who that have left women brutalized and the heroism of the zero men and women themselves and the doctors and nurses and volunteers working to repair bodies and spirits. they are on the frontlines of the struggle he for human

rights. seen firsthand their courage and tenacity, of they and the congolese people and the internal jordan to that keeps them going, not only humbling and inspires me every day to keep working. those four aspects of our approach, the accountability, pragmatism, keeping alive focus where rights are its stake, that will help build a nation where it enables people to stand and rise above party, hunger, and disease and secures their rights under democratic governance. we must live to the feeling of oppression, corruption, and violence. build a foundation, lift the ceiling, and let the fire altogether all at once. when a person has food and education, but not the freedom to discuss and debate with

fellow citizens, he is denied the life he deserves. when a person is to hungry or sick to work or vote for worship, she is denied a life she deserves. freedom does not come in half measures and partial remedies cannot redress the whole problem. we know that the champions of human potential have never had it easy. we may call rights inalienable, but it has always been hard work. no matter how clearly we see our ideals, taking action to make them real requires tough choices. even if everyone agrees on what everybody needs on the ground, we will not always agree what course of action fits. that is the nature of governing. we all know examples of good intentions that did not produce

results, some that even produced unintended consequences that led to greater violations of human rights. we can learn from the instances in which we have fallen short in the past. those past difficulties are proof of how difficult progress is. but we do not accept the argument by some of that progress in certain places is impossible. we note progress happens. donna emerged from an era of good cause -- gahna emerged from and era of coups. chile exchange a dictatorship for democracy. there is no better example in the progress made in central and eastern europe since the fall of the berlin wall 20 years ago, an

event that was privileged to help celebrate last month at the brandenburg gate. while the work in front of us is daunting, we face the future together with partners in every continent. from india, the world's largest democracy and one that continues to use democratic process is and principals to perfect its union of 1.1 billion people to botswana where the president has promised to govern by democracy, dignity, development, discipline, and delivery, providing a recipe for responsible governance that contrasts starkly with the unnecessary and man made a tragedy in neighboring zimbabwe. in the end, this is not just about what we do.

it is about who we are. we can be the people we are, people who believe in human rights, if we opt out of this fight. believing in human rights means committing ourselves to action. when we sign up for the promise of rights that apply everywhere to everyone, rice will be able to protect and unable human dignity -- we also signed up for the hardware to make that promise a reality. those of you -- we also signed up for the hard work to make that promise a reality. ucd shortcomings in the shortfalls. -- you see the shortcomings and the shortfalls. but we need your ideas.

we need your criticism. we need your support. we need your intelligence analysis of how together we can slowly, steadily expand that circle of opportunity and rights to every single person. it is work that we take so seriously. it is work that we know we do not have all the answers for. but it is the work that america signed up to do. and we will continue, day-by- day, inch by inch, to try to make whatever progress is humanly possible. thank you all very much. [applause]